


Kicking Up a Storm

by Jeevey



Category: Oasis (Band)
Genre: Baby Oasis, Gen, like actual babies
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-05
Updated: 2020-04-05
Packaged: 2021-02-28 21:20:49
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,575
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23493847
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Jeevey/pseuds/Jeevey
Summary: Late September, 1972, Longsight, Manchester. Public nurse Nancy Browne's job is to keep vulnerable babies from being re-hospitalized. She can hear this one screaming from down the street.
Comments: 7
Kudos: 20





	Kicking Up a Storm

**Author's Note:**

> Hey all, after the emotional marathon that was _Peggy_ I really felt like it was time for something a little lighter and sweeter. This one has been on my back burner for some time. I really enjoy thinking about these guys within their context, and I hope that some of you do too despite the lack of smut.

Nancy Browne walked the streets of Longsight with her nurse’s kit gripped in her hand. She was beginning to enjoy the sound of her white oxford heels on the sidewalk now, after four months in the city. It was a fine September day, with a crisp dry wind blowing, and she hefted her kit over her shoulder with a little swing and skip at the fineness of it all. Then she smoothed her cap and looked around to make sure no one had seen.

She’d come to live with her daughter in Longsight after the sudden passing of her man in the winter. Nance had never lived alone before and the silence of the house after the wake oppressed her. She found herself working more and more and, after the day that she threw away all of her mother’s antimacassars in a fit of Saturday boredom, decided that she needed a change of scene.

That was easily found in Manchester. It was only thirty miles by train from Clitheroe but a world apart entirely, as far as Nance could tell. Public health nurses were in short supply in a city so large and poor, of course, and one so experienced as she was rare as hen’s teeth. She spoke to the Head of Maternty at Longsight Hospital for just a quarter of an hour, and he immediately sent her to the worst slums of the city to look after the new mothers just home from the hospital. 

This neighborhood was not so bad as others she’d seen. None so bad as Moss Side, not even so bad as Oldham. This was workman’s housing, and though the brick terrace houses stretched narrow and poor as far as the eye could see, she saw no broken brick or empty windows. These families were on the dole, but not in squalor. 

She passed a knot of weans too young for school drawing on the sidewalk and looked them over sharply. Thin and too pale, but likely not carrying worms and no rickets; she’d seen worse. They stared at her white uniform curiously as she passed. She pulled an india rubber ball from her kit, held it up so they could see, and bounced it against the nearest brick wall. Instantly one of them leaped to catch it, and soon they had a game of walley going. Only one of them was slow to join in, and watched Nance in wary suspicion until she crossed to the next block.

Nance began to dig in her pocket for the house number but soon put it away; she could hear a newborn screaming from a block away. By the time she reached the stoop the sound was almost intolerable in intensity. She didn’t know if the wean had a wee bit of gas or an impacted bowel, but clearly it felt it was in the last extremity of distress. Poor mother, stuck inside with that roar! Nance knocked on the door, but received no more answer than she expected. One probably couldn’t hear a steam train from inside a room with that baby, let alone a knock. Luckily the young mother had been put on notice to expect a visit on this day or the next, so Nance just opened the door to shout halloo.

“Aye, in!” shouted a distinctly west Irish voice, and Nance closed the door behind her.

A pair of muddy workboots stood on the entry mat. So, Daddy was a roustabout then, down to the pub in his clean shoes on a work day.

Inside she found a stuffy room with curtains tightly drawn despite the fine day, perhaps in hope that dark would help the babe to sleep, or perhaps in hope of sparing the neighbors a headache. In the dim sitting room a young woman sat on the sofa, a flailing newborn in her arms. She was a wee mouse of a woman: pale, underweight, and harassed as all the mothers of Longsight semed to be. The sight of them made Nance miss the heavy farmer’s daughters of North Lancashire with their round faced seven-months’ babies. Country girls ate well no matter how poor, and their babies were fat and rosy, while the city mams seemed to exist on nowt but porridge and potatoes, and haemorrhaged at a shocking rate. This one was friendly and bright, though, with a vivid set of blue eyes in her thin face. She flashed a look of genuine gratitude at Nance. Then her attention returned to the screaming infant in her arms, and her eyes filled with tears.

“Sha, sha,” Nance said and scooped the wean up. “Go wash your face, girl. This one’ll bide with me a moment.”

In the time she was gone Nance took a quick look around the room. At least one other child but probably two, and not a ribbon or a bow in the house; this woman was in a strange country, in a house full of men. No wonder she looked exhausted.

The mother was back in a flash, taking the baby possessively into her arms even though his screams continued unabated and her eyes stung pink again at his weight.

“Mammy’s in Ireland?” Nance asked.

The mother nodded. “She was going to come, but my sister’s children all got sick with the grippe...”

“Ah,” Nance said gently. “Well. Let’s have a look at this babby.”

Unbelievably, the infant’s screams grew louder as his clothes were stripped away. Nance looked him over carefully. He was a fine specimen as Manchester babies went, with chubby thighs and a bell-shaped belly. His skin didn’t have the crepey yellow look of an undernourished infant, and his soaking nappy showed he was eating enough. So much, so good. She pulled out the metal dial and fabric sling of an infant scale and asked the mother to read the dial as she held him up in his little hammock. She flushed and squinted importantly as she did so; mothers were always thrilled to read the baby’s weight themselves. But most interestingly, the baby hushed abruptly as the fabric sling closed around his body.

“Ah,” said Nance. “Ah, I see now. What a smart lad you are! Telling us all the time what you want. Alright now, we’ll see to it.” She turned her attention to the mother on the sofa. “Have you got a clean flannel blanket?”

Nance re-dressed the baby, put him on a receiving blanket of the sort sent home from the hospital, and began to wrap him up. He flailed so angrily that she had to pin his legs down to get them wrapped.

“Does he like that?” the mother said as he struggled.

“No. But I think he will in a minute,” Nance said grimly. It was the same all the way through, first the left arm, the head, then the right arm had to be pinned in turn and tucked securely in. At last the baby lay in a little bundle, wrapped so tightly that he couldn’t move a bit. He turned bright pink with struggle. gave one last shuddering whine, and grew still.

“Mary, Jesus, and Bride,” whispered the mother. Nance grinned in triumph.

“There. We call it a Lancashire pasty,” she said. The mother’s eyes grew wide. “Some babies think it’s scary on the outside,” Nance explained. “They like being squished up in the womb, and they scare themselves with wiggling. This one, he’d probably rather be back in the belly. But when he’s tied up like this he knows where he is. Ooh!”

The baby had opened his eyes for the first time; startling, electric blue eyes like his mother’s. He surveyed her with a look of wonder.

“So you’ve decided to join us then?” Nance asked him. “It’s none so bad out here. And you’ve got a good mammy, haven’t you?” She placed the baby back in his mother’s arms and began to rearrange her kit. Out of the corner of her eye she watched the young mother, the dark circles under her eyes and the droop of her head. She needed rest.

“Have you put him to the tit?” Nance asked.

“No!” the mother flushed. “Of course not. It’s...low. And dirty.”

“I’d do it with this one all the same, at least when you’re at home,” Nance said. “He’ll like being squeezed tight in your arm, and he’ll like the smell of it. He’ll cry less, and grow more.”

She showed the mother how to adjust her brassiere and how to tuck him into the crook of her arm. “Squeeze him pretty tight there. He’s young enough to still have his rooting instinct...there. Ah! See how he likes it!”

The baby began to rootle and grunt, and soon the mother’s eyes popped open at the fierce latch of his little mouth. She flushed scarlet with embarrassment. 

“Good lad!” cried Nance. “You’re a canny one, and no mistake. See how his mouth his wide open, and his gob stuffed right full? That’s what you want to see. If his mouth gets small and pinched, break him off with your finger and make him do it again.”

“Well, if his mouth _will_ be open one way or the other,” the mother murmured in resignation.

There was a pounding of small feet at the door, and one of the children from the street burst in, the wary one. He stopped short, plainly unused to visitors, and looked from his mother to Nance in suspicion. 

“Noel, come say hello to Miss Nancy,” his mother said. He was a handsome boy despite being undersized, with pleasant round cheeks and the striking family eyes. But his vigilant look didn’t make Nance think any better at all of the absent father. She felt perfectly sure that the mother would not allow him to be examined with his jumper off.

The boy approached to say hello but was immediately distracted by his brother’s novel position. The baby nursed with an intense concentration of bliss, and his little hand pressed flat to his mother’s breast as though to hold her from disappearing. The mother’s hand stroked him absently, affectionately.

“Did I have that when I was a littl’un?” Noel asked.

“No,” his mother said. “You certainly didn’t.”

“Why not?” he asked. 

“Because were were a good little lad who always did as you ought,” his mother replied. The boy didn’t answer back, but his expression clearly showed that he thought the rewards of naughtiness looked pretty good. Nance smiled. This was a lad who knew what he wanted, no doubt about it.

The baby had broken off at the sound of his brother’s voice and craned until he caught sight of him. “Ah! He likes his brother, then,” Nance said.

“Noel is the best brother in the world,” the little mother said. The children didn’t even hear her. Noel had bent to his brother—instinctively choosing just the right distance for baby vision, Nance noted, and the two of them were engaged in a game of slow blinking and tongue-waving.

Nance sighed and took her bearings. The babe would suck well, and this gave her an excuse to make sure the mother fed and rested herself. How well could she be fed, though, as poor as they were? She didn’t want to look in the kitchen, but she was willing to guess it had few vegetables and less meat.

“It looks like the tit will help with his crying,” she told the bemused mother, “But we’ll have to make sure you’re proper fed to keep your milk up. Noel, did I see a market on the corner as I came in?”

The boy looked up from his brother just long enough to nod.

“Are you big enough to run for some things for your mammy and brother?” That got his attention. He stood and nodded proudly. “Take this, then, and get three kilograms of chicken legs, and she’ll make you a nice soup tomorrow.” She handed him a five pound note, and he clattered out of the house. The mother was already returning the baby to her breast, unthinking. Aye, this would do very well, Nance thought in satisfaction.

“Let him suck as often as he wants,” she instructed, “And you rest whenever he does. I’ve got a card here for a soup as’ll build your blood. You must cook the chicken 'til the bones are all hollow, mind, and leave the jackets on the potatoes for the vitamins.”

“Tommy won’t have potatoes with the skins on,” the mother said.

“Did I say the soup was for him, now?” Nance said. “Nay, it’s women’s and children’s food. Let him have whatever he wants for his tea. This is what you and Noel eat for dinner, innit.”

“Won’t it hurt the baby to...” the mother looked down in faint embarrassment, “quite so much?”

“No, never worry. My mam was a Humberwoman and she always swore that sucking made the children braw and handsome. When he’s ready to eat put him on egg yolks and stewed beef if you can, not cereal. Let him chew on a swede or celery root when his teeth come in. My mam did it for all of hers, and we all still have all our teeth.” 

The little mother smiled wanly, and together they watched the baby. His jaw moved more slowly now, and he was relaxed enough to gaze at his mother in starry wonder.

“When he gets all lovey like that you know he’s ready to sleep,” Nance said. “You can pop him off with your finger in the corner of his mouth.” She demonstrated. Together they watched him blink once or twice. Then his little lids slide shut, and stayed there. The mother sighed as though the weight of a train had rolled from her shoulders. Nance patted her shoulder.

The little boy had come in, much more quietly than Nance expected, and stood watching from the door. Nance motioned him in.

“You’re a good lad, and a good brother,” Nance told him. “Do you know how to fetch Mam a cuppa, or find her book or summat?”

He nodded, proud again. 

“That’s your job, then, when Mammy’s letting the baby suck. She takes care of the baby, and you take care of her, alright? It’s hard work to make a baby, you know.” The mother’s eyes were already drooping, and Nance could see the boy take note of it. 

She pulled a coloring book and crayons from her kit. It was full of space men, rocket ships, planets. “D’you like to color?” she asked. He nodded, glowing. “This is for you to do while Mammy rests, then. Only while she’s resting and the baby sucks, mind! Will you do one for your brother or your mam first?”

“Brother,” he replied, and sat down to work. 

“That’s a good lad. Now tell your mammy when she wakes that I’ll be around again next week, can you do that?” He nodded, not sparing her any attention from his space man.

Nance peeped behind her just before she closed the door. The baby was breathing with the puffer-train breath of a sleeping, well-fed baby. The mother was fast sliding into a doze herself. On the floor in front of them the little boy spread out his crayons, vigilantly dividing his attention between his mother and brother and his project. All would be well here. Surely, Nance thought, it would.


End file.
